The government admits it really wants to see your genitals at the airport

And we thought things couldn’t get any stranger.

Earlier this week, I suggested it might be the end of the world for travelers, thanks to a preponderance of odd events. I was kidding, of course.

But I should have written that post yesterday when the TSA out-bizarred all of us by publishing a post delicately titled, A Friendly Suggestion on Products Designed to Conceal Sensitive Areas, on its blog.

I’m not kidding this time. Read it for yourself.

In the post, the TSA’s infamous Blogger Bob says the TSA knows about those special undergarments that hide your “junk” when you go through a full-body scanner, and it is not amused.

He writes,

If there is something shielding an area and we don’t know what’s under it, we have to conduct a pat-down.

So basically, passengers should be aware that the use of these types of products will likely result in a pat-down.

Some might think this is TSA’s way of getting back at clever passengers. That’s not the case at all. It’s just security.

Just security, huh?

What the TSA seems to be saying is that 1) the scanners can capture a sharp image of your private parts, contradicting previous claims that the scans produce blurry results, and 2) that indeed, it requires a good shot of the family jewels before you can be cleared to fly. Alternatively, it needs to feel them.

I’m not sure I like where this is going.

(Photo: Ennui poet/Flickr Creative Commons)

  • BucksterSF

    @chris – I usually read you over morning coffee, so please don’t do that to me again (referring to the image). =)

    On the issue of concealing, I don’t think they’re looking at my “junk” but if it comes up with some bright anomaly (like a bright spot on a chest x-ray) it would reasonably lead an agent to suspect the passenger was trying to conceal something.

    To me this is like joking about a bomb in the screening area.

  • http://www.alaskatravelgram.com Scott McMurren

    I now must spend the next 10 minutes cleaning the coffee off my keyboard and desk. If this is not stranger than fiction, I do not know what is. And, btw, I am not joking about a bomb in the screening area. I am joking about the entire “security theater” that is the expensive sham we know as the TSA. And, of course, the joke is on us. AAAAGGGHHH.

  • Thomas

    I’m still waiting for the day TSA tells me they’re going to do a full pat-down on me. Guess I’ll just have to make sure I carry enough bond money on me, I don’t think it’ll be pretty.

  • Joel

    Wow, Chris. Just when I start to forget you’re a journalist you put up a headline that’s as sensationalist and disingenuous as if you were auditioning for a spot on FOX news. They don’t want to see your junk. They just don’t want scans with everyone purposefully concealing something — sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

  • Christopher Elliott

    @Joel, sorry you didn’t like my headline. :-(

    Can you suggest a better one?

  • cjr

    “They don’t want to see your junk.” Then they need to prove
    it by getting rid of the porno-scanners. Until then, there is no
    other way to interpret their actions.

  • Mekhong Kurt

    Chris, from my personal perspective, this is something of a
    tough one, no matter how I walk around it, kick the tires,
    ruminate, etc. On the one hand, there are limits, limits for all of
    us, in terms of what we’re willing to accept to achieve a
    satisfactory degree of security. On the other hand, as a former
    privagte security officer — though not in a position involving
    airport security (nor, indeed, not any public transportation, not
    terminals nor the conveyances), I understand that TSO’s who are
    genuinely trying to do their jobs have their needs to be satisfied
    that security concerns have been addressed. I see two difficulties,
    each operating in two different, though closely connected, spheres.
    First, one passenger’s idea of what’s acceptable from a TSO may
    well be quite different from the next person, to the point that
    they actually have contradictory or opposing ideas. The widely
    varied opinions of the definition of “acceptable” is when we’re
    talking about TSO’s’ behavior makes it tough — a lack of
    consensus. Second, and staying with passengers, therem is similar
    variety of opinion regarding the answer to “What is a minimally
    acceptable level of security?” Third and fourth? Repeat the two
    above, but in the context of the TSO’s. I’ve defended the TSA and
    its TSO’s in the past, but it’s becoming a bit harder to do so.
    Just under three weeks ago I flew to the US from abr4oad, at at the
    port of entry airport, first, a TSO was somewhat abrupt, bordering
    on the hostile, though I never give people in authority the
    slightest trouble — doing so is a no-win situation for me, if
    nothing else. Second, another TSO entered the scene, and initially
    gave me an order directly contradicting what the first one had just
    ordered me to do. I just looked at them and told them I wanted to
    cooperate and would do whatever they wanted me to do, so long as I
    knew just what that was. It worked out quicjly and okay, with me
    being quickly cleared to catch my next flight, but it was
    thought-provoking. Personally, I probably would submit to an
    invasive imaging technique or pat-down without *too* much beef,
    though I would want to be told *some* sort of halfway
    reasonable-souding reason for being asked/ordered to submit to such
    – but I get it that there are many others who aren’t willing to go
    quite that far, and I understand that. When I worked in security, I
    never frisked a lady unless it was absolutely necessary, right now,
    and unable to wait until I could get a female officer on the scene.
    (Ditto for female officers frisking male subjects, though that
    didn’t engender nearly as much controversy as male-on-female
    scenarios.) I’ve read and heard — the latter face-to-face –
    complaints of both male TSO’s being a little TOO “thorough” in
    frisking a lady (paying particular attention to a lady’s breasts
    and so on, especially attractive younger ladies). I’ve also heard
    of female TSO’s being way aggressive with male passengers without
    any apprent justification at all, the officer getting overly rough,
    especially with the family jewels. Seems to me both sides need to
    give, and to give quite a bit. Passengers need to educate
    themselves to some degree about airport and airplane security. The
    TSA needs to provide *much* better and more extensive training than
    it does — and please, no TSA admin type get on here to blah-blah
    about what is required, since what is — in theory — required is
    being left behind in practice, a fact widely known (and damned
    unfair to the front-line officers left to grapple with sticky
    situations sans training); and the TSO’s need to take a deep breath
    now and then themselves. Last point, Chris is that this particular
    headline does have a faint aroma of the sensational about it. Not
    chewing your butt, just concurring with an earlier comment in this
    thread, if gently concurring.

  • Mekhong Kurt

    P.S. Forgot to say anything regarding cavity searches. If
    given a VERY good reason, I probably would cooperate, if sullenly.
    But without a good reason, they’d either be talking to my lawyer
    and the police, or dragging me down protesting. I am flexible. I
    also have my own breaking point, though it’s pretty remote (meaning
    a TSO shouldn’t have much trouble getting me to cooperate to the
    point he or she is satisfie).

  • Eric

    What I’m afraid of is that it’s only a matter of time
    before some muslim boards a plane in the Netherlands with a stick
    of dynamite shoved up his rear. What’s the TSA gonna do then? If
    the TSA ever tries to do a body cavity search on me, things are
    gonna get messy. And I mean that literally.

  • Thomas

    @ Joel

    I thought Chris’ headline was pretty good.

    OK, let’s see. Fox Headline: : TSA agents caught posting scanned pictures of women’s breasts online.
    CNN Headline : TSA agents sue government over eye stress from observing travelers genitalia.

    Lighten up !!!!!!!

  • Sommer Gentry

    The government does indeed want to take pictures of my
    genitals, but I value myself and my body way too much to get in
    line to pose for these TSA bullies to ogle me. These filthy
    perverts need a punch in the face from Congress to make them stop
    sexually abusing passengers. In order to facilitate this, please
    call your state’s two senators and your representative today! It
    only takes two minutes to call and register your opinion. Find
    contact information here: http://www.senate.gov and http://www.house.gov

  • FJP

    Much as I hate to say so, I think TSA is right on this one. While the seller of this product does not intend for it to be used to hide anything beyond the family jewels, the reality is it could be used to conceal dangerous items from the scanners. It’s impossible for TSA to ignore that fact and wave the passenger through.

  • maplestar

    The way I read it, the TSA is making a very simple point. If something is hidden from their scanners, they have no way of knowing whether you’re hiding your junk or whether you’re hiding something that can do harm to the aircraft. Just think about it for a second. If something is going to hide your genitals from the TSA, how do they know that there’s nothing else hidden there?

  • John

    I agree with @FJP, @maplestar and others. TSA has the job to make sure that “bad things” don’t get through the checkpoints. As I’ve said other places, I’m sure that those that are screaming the loudest about TSA searches now will be the one screaming even louder if something ever got through or the TSA stopped searching for a known threat do to public opinion and terrorist (homegrown or otherwise) used that to inflict injury.
    Sorry but Blogger Bob is correct. If you are obviously hiding something at a checkpoint (and wearing the underware does this), the TSA has to find out what you are hiding even if its just your “junk.”

  • cjr

    “As I’ve said other places”

    You can say it as often as you like, and you’d be wrong.

    “TSA-proof” underwear or not, something WILL get through again eventually because TSA is simply incompetent.

    Many banned items get through security every day, yet we continue to expect them to stop a real terrorist with this security theater.

  • thomas h white

    Well, with the amount of weapons and contraband snuck into prison in body cavities we should all realize that the current methods used for air travel aren’t going to work. Get ready for general usage of Body Orifice Security Scanners.

    These are real by the way (google them). Although, they are meant to pick up metal so they wouldn’t pick up the explosives you could hide in there.

  • Duke Nukem

    I’m gonna start asking for cute female TSOs to pat me down…That’d be messy too, hehehehehe!

  • Ed

    My problem is that unless *EVERYBODY* goes through the scanners or the pat-down, nobody is safe! Think about this…if a congressman or senator flies on a scheduled flight, he/she doesn’t go through the security screening…Who’s to say what that individual may have on their person? I’m not saying that one of our elected officials will do something rash on a plane (why should they…they do it legally every day in congress), but what about a crime of opportunity for another passenger? Perhaps a pocket knife falls out of the congressman’s jacket pocket when he reclines in his first-class seat (paid for by you and me) and a disgruntled passenger passes by and sees the knife and this is all they need to take revenge on his treatment at the hands of the airline and TSA!

  • John

    @Ed … Chris can correct me if I’m wrong but I thought he busted the myth that members of Congress aren’t screened. I think they only bypass screening if they’re travelling with an armed security detail

  • Aaron

    Amazing. As far as I know, if I allow someone to see, photograph or video tape my minor children’s genitals, I can be arrested as a pedophile or child pornographer. But if I refuse to to allow that at the airport, they can’t fly? WTF? Time to write my congresspeople…AGAIN.

    Aaron

  • Mary Graham

    So glad I don’t fly anymore

  • Jennifer

    Wow. Did someone actually say in these comments that he/she
    would be OK with a cavity search? Now granted, that post and the
    previous post by the same person were incredibly difficult to
    understand but I think that’s what it said. I think I must have
    woken up in an alternate universe. I guess for some people there
    really isn’t any line the TSA can’t cross “in the name of
    security.”

  • Mike Z

    To my knowledge, we have given up more and more of our
    rights at the airport every year since 9/11 happened and yet the
    TSA has never stopped a single attack. The whole agency is just a
    bloated waste of our taxpayer and flying public dollar. They are
    reactionary and come up with new ways to invade our privacy. At
    some point, not even public interest can outweigh the
    unconstitutional actions of the TSA.

  • John

    @cjr… Remind me the TSA has let exactly how many
    terrorists who then did something on to airplanes in the last 10
    years? My recollection is 0. Every attack has come from overseas
    and initiated before they landed in the US. I also know I’ve seen
    reports where the TSA has apprehended thousands of felons (the
    behavioral detection program has led to 1700 arrests alone). How
    many celebs have been caught with weapons in their carry-ons? Since
    those are the only people we hear about being caught. So that would
    seem to be a pretty competent organization. I’m not a big fan of
    the TSA but they screen millions of people everyday with a low
    failure rate. In fact, for terrorist incidences (that they were
    created to prevent) their failure rate is 0.

  • Thomas

    @ John

    You’re right, Not a single terrorist has gotten on a flight in the US (THAT WE KNOW OF) I also agree that every attack has come from overseas. That’s why the perfect scenario would be if we shipped all the back scanner machines and the entire TSA organization overseas. They could spend their entire day touching people wanting to come to the States, they wouldn’t be here, and we’d all be happier!

  • D-Money

    If they need to do “crotch inspections” why don’t they just let the bomb-sniffing dogs do it?

  • http://DontScan.me Wimpie

    1. These underwear are a GIMMICK! They don’t actually work!
    It’s quite easy to foil the MM wave scanners, but the X-ray Backscatter scanners see right through. It’s ridiculous to try these underwear anyway – just OPT-OUT!
    The good news is that it keeps the issue in the press and generates lots of rumors and water-cooler discussions. We need to get rid of both scanners and pat-downs, as they DON’T MAKE US SAFER!

    Thomas is right – Ship the whole mess overseas, where the threat might be. There is no threat here in the USA – The TSA record is 0 terrorists caught, millions and millions annoyed, 50 Billion wasted, and the Constitution TRASHED!

    How about the 3000 each month killed on American highways?

  • doesnotequal

    “What I’m afraid of is that it’s only a matter of time
    before some muslim boards a plane in the Netherlands with a stick
    of dynamite shoved up his rear. ”

    I’m pretty sure what Eric meant to say was “some terrorist”. Thank you, have a nice day.

  • cjr

    “So that would seem to be a pretty competent organization.”

    Wrong. If they actually stopped an attack, we would never hear the end of it. The propaganda would increase, as would the funding and the porno-scanners and groping.

    “In fact, for terrorist incidences (that they were created to prevent) their failure rate is 0.”

    No, their failure rate is 100%, as the incidents in recent years were either blunders by the terrorists themselves, or stopped by passengers.

  • Worried

    @doesnotequal

    Of course it would be a terrorist that tried to get explosives on a plane. While someone may confuse muslims with terrorist, it is a often made mistake. While it is true that all muslims are not terrorists, it is also true that all terrorists that have made an ‘explosive’ statement aginst the US are indeeed Muslims.

    I am not an Islamphobic person and do know many muslims throughout the world. Some of them I actually consider friends but jihad is one of the tennants of Islam. You can be fooled about moderate muslims but believe what you will but terrorists attacks against us have been by muslims. It makes sense to look at muslims when trying to find terrorists.

    Someone explained it to me at though it was fishing. If you want to have fish for supper, you don’t fish in the bath tub, you go to where the fish are. If you want to find terrorists, you have to look at muslims.

    For those not sure, a book by Robert Spencer called Stelth Jihad is a informative look at what we have to look forward to.

  • Kevin M

    Worried,

    >>all terrorists that have made an ‘explosive’ statement aginst the US are indeeed Muslims<<

    As I recall, Timothy McVeigh was not a Muslim. Ted Kaczinski is not a Muslim. The people who blew up Ebenezer Baptist Church in the 1960's were not Muslims. It is true that none of them attacked an airplane, but there is no doubt we would consider them terrorists under any rational definition of the term, and we can safely assume that not all future terrorist attacks will come via the aviation system.

    I'm so happy your friend was able to dumb down hunting for terrorists to the level of bathtubs and fishing, but I do believe it's a tad more complex than that.

  • B.J.

    Just came back from a trip to Germany, etc. over the
    holidays. The only place a body scan was done was in Amsterdam.
    Other than that no intrusive checks any where in US. But armed
    guards (military?) & police very prominent in airports in
    the European countries I was in. Can’t say being scanned was at all
    traumatic because by then with all the snow & delays I just
    wanted to get on that plane & fly home. It seemed everyone
    else felt the same as there were no incidents. BTW we ALL were
    scanned.

  • John

    @cjr … Thanks for making my point for me. All the attacks
    since 9/11 have originated outside the US and TSA control. The
    failures have been with the foreign screening services not the TSA.
    Therefore, they still have a failure rate of 0. Since 9/11 not a
    single terrorist incident has occurred on a US aircraft leaving a
    US airport. So… One could make the inferrence that US security is
    much harder for terrorists to crack or they would attack us here
    where it makes better headlines.

  • John

    @Kevin … thank you. I think we all forget that there are
    terrorists who have nothing to do with Islam.

  • Shari

    Just remember Chris, most people are of the mindset “I don’t care what the TSA does in the name of security.” It’s only a matter of time before things become more invasive than they already are. People are happily giving up their liberties in the name of security, and don’t care that they’ll never get them back.

  • Thomas
  • http://www.lamey.us.com Pat Lamey

    Returning from Maui (OGG), my sister-in-law received her regular pat down because she has artificial hips and knees. All that titanium always sets off the metal detectors. We stopped at the nearest coffee shop to ‘repack’ after the inspection and she could not find her picture ID and boarding passes (three for OGG-LAX-ORD-MSP). Unpacking all the carry-on three times plus two trips back to TSA were unproductive although she was convinced she left them in one of the tubs. TSA did take a report on the last visit. At the gate, the UA agent issued the three boarding passes because she had gained entry with the now missing picture ID and boarding pass plus she had reported the loss to TSA.
    I left her and her husband at the LAX gate because I was flying to SFO where I live. I was worried, of course, that something would snafu and she would be stranded at either LAX or ORD. I got regular text messages about their progress although the concern did not go away until they sent a message after arriving at MSP.
    They live several hours drive from MSP and I received a phone call about three hours after the MSP arrival text.
    “We found the boarding passes and drivers license. We discovered them as she undressed to shower once we were home.”
    Nope, not where you are thinking!
    She wore them all the way home in the bottom of her shoe.

  • doesnotequal

    “Some of them I actually consider friends but jihad is one of the tennants of Islam. ”

    Wow, you ACTUALLY consider them friends? I stand corrected. You’re not Islamophobic at all……

  • cjr

    “One could make the inferrence”

    No, one shouldn’t, because it’s misguided in the extreme.

  • Worried

    @ doesnotequal
    Some of them, yes. Not every Muslim believes in the dark side of Islam, just as not every ‘Christian’ believes everything about our own religions. They are Muslim by birth, not by choice and many have the same values we do. The big problem is to admit it can be a death sentence. It is a difficult thing to discuss because even discussion can be considered criminal with serious jail time (or worse). They can not fathom any reason to kill anyone, much less themselves and if they were in a free society such as ours, it would not be an issue. Being friends doesn’t mean I would advocate giving them a green card, it means we are friends. Nothing more.

    @Kevin M
    Thanks for the reminder. Having served in Gulf 1 and my kids are serving in the sand as we speak, our minds are on the current threat which is primarily Muslim. It is true that criminals come in all flavors and not just the ones on the top of our list. Was McVey a whacked out criminal or a terrorist? Does that make the KKK terrorist or just hate mongers? I guess my definition of terrorist refers to the current group of people that hate us more than every one else. Those who’s acts are directly responsible for the increases in security at airports and are what keeps TSA in power. In my mind, that the Muslims.

  • http://www.RockyFlatsGear.com Jeff Buske

    In reading the many thoughtful comments privacy is a big
    issue to many as well as being groped. What is missing is the
    public debate health risk from general use of ionizing radiation
    for security, it will perhaps kill more than “terrorists”. Also the
    minor issue of stored images is not discussed. We make the “special
    undergarments” to promote dignity, raise public awareness and
    promote public health. We certainly created public debate. Jeff
    RockyFlatsGear.com